The well-known sportscaster delivers a warts-and-all self-portrait of himself and the business.
Smith—“ ‘Stephen A.’ these days, no last name necessary”—doesn’t expect to be liked, and for good reason: His off-the-cuff commentary on ESPN and other venues has sometimes been ill considered, though perhaps for understandable reasons. “On a show like First Take, or any live debate show,” he writes, “something that causes an uproar happens almost every day. The objective of these shows is to have opposite points of view. To be candid: we capitalize on the kind of polarization people supposedly abhor.” That said, Smith has sometimes pushed things beyond the bounds of good sense, and he’s paid the price for it, though he’s still on the air. Some of his prejudices are well founded. For example, he despises the Dallas Cowboys, not for the team’s players or management but because “I believe they have the most disgusting, nauseating fan base in the annals of sports.” Other of his remarks have smacked of bigotry, though, as when he complained that Los Angeles Angels star Shohei Ohtani “is a dude that needs an interpreter so you can understand what the hell he’s saying,” an especially ill-considered remark in a time of anti-Asian sentiment. To his credit, Smith owns his words and doesn’t try to explain his mistakes away. The best part of the book is his nuanced portrait of how the sports journalism world works, with its almost nonstop personality clashes and sometimes unlikely alliances—and the constant scheming of executives to shake things up for better ratings and bigger money. Of his being paired with Skip Bayless on that ESPN debate show, for instance, he comments, “We didn’t give a shit what anyone thought about it. In the end, we knew we were feeding the audience, and the bottom line.”
An inside-baseball look at the business of TV sports through the eyes of a veteran, sometimes controversial presence.Pub Date: Jan. 17, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-982189-49-5
Page Count: 288
Publisher: 13A/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2022
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A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 28, 2022
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The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.
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The former iCarly star reflects on her difficult childhood.
In her debut memoir, titled after her 2020 one-woman show, singer and actor McCurdy (b. 1992) reveals the raw details of what she describes as years of emotional abuse at the hands of her demanding, emotionally unstable stage mom, Debra. Born in Los Angeles, the author, along with three older brothers, grew up in a home controlled by her mother. When McCurdy was 3, her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. Though she initially survived, the disease’s recurrence would ultimately take her life when the author was 21. McCurdy candidly reconstructs those in-between years, showing how “my mom emotionally, mentally, and physically abused me in ways that will forever impact me.” Insistent on molding her only daughter into “Mommy’s little actress,” Debra shuffled her to auditions beginning at age 6. As she matured and starting booking acting gigs, McCurdy remained “desperate to impress Mom,” while Debra became increasingly obsessive about her daughter’s physical appearance. She tinted her daughter’s eyelashes, whitened her teeth, enforced a tightly monitored regimen of “calorie restriction,” and performed regular genital exams on her as a teenager. Eventually, the author grew understandably resentful and tried to distance herself from her mother. As a young celebrity, however, McCurdy became vulnerable to eating disorders, alcohol addiction, self-loathing, and unstable relationships. Throughout the book, she honestly portrays Debra’s cruel perfectionist personality and abusive behavior patterns, showing a woman who could get enraged by everything from crooked eyeliner to spilled milk. At the same time, McCurdy exhibits compassion for her deeply flawed mother. Late in the book, she shares a crushing secret her father revealed to her as an adult. While McCurdy didn’t emerge from her childhood unscathed, she’s managed to spin her harrowing experience into a sold-out stage act and achieve a form of catharsis that puts her mind, body, and acting career at peace.
The heartbreaking story of an emotionally battered child delivered with captivating candor and grace.Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-982185-82-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2022
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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